Vinylmation: Marvel Comics - Dr. Strange (Series 1)

Another part of my Walt Disney World haul I brought home last month was another Vinylmation figure.  This was actually my first Vinylmation purchase and I grabbed it while my wife and I were childless one evening at Downtown Disney.

On our way back to catch the bus (and to seek out something sweet for my wife to eat) I saw a store that had a lot of Marvel Comics memorabilia.  While my wife was getting herself some chocolate next door, I popped in to see what the store had to offer.  I saw some cool t-shirts and some nice painted canvas art by artist Ed McGuiness.  Most of the items in the store were pretty expensive so I kept walking.  Before I headed out I noticed several trays of blind packaged vinyl figures.  Marvel Vinylmation?  I hadn't seen these before!  Little did I know they were literally just released maybe a day or two earlier.  Explains all of the case fresh display trays that hadn't been picked through yet.

The boxes feature some really nice art by Ed McGuiness and along w/ the matte black top and the bold Marvel logo, these little boxes really stand out in a crowded store.  Just like the Little Mermaid figure I bought, these too retailed for $12.95.  I had to at least grab one to see what they were like, right?

I was already sold on taking a chance, but then I flipped the box over and saw the 11 characters that could possibly be in the box.  I really wanted Captain America as he is one of my favorite Marvel characters and he appeared to be the only figure that came w/ an accessory (his shield), but dang just about all of them look cool.  Iron Man, Hulk, Vision, Spider Woman...which one would I get?  And what is this mystery figure?

  

Dr. Stephen Strange.  OK, not one I was hoping for, but still a cool figure none the less.  After messing around with him for a bit I did notice that his cape is an extra piece that the other figures don't have.  Then again Black Widow doesn't have a cape.  These figures are painted very nicely and look great in person.  I love the way the back of his head is painted.  You get his salt and pepper hair along w/ the top part of his cape.  I'm guess his Mickey ears are supposed to be some sort of spell he is conjuring.

After getting back to our room later that night I hit up Google to find out more information on these Marvel Vinylmation figures.  Turns out there are two variant figures to chase in addition to the mystery figure.  That mysterious figure happened to be Ultron by the way.  While I couldn't find production codes to give away the surprise inside, I did find a few images of supposedly in the order certain characters were packaged.  Black Panther seems to be the most common so at least I defied the odds a bit.

I've thought about checking out the local Disney Store at some point to see if they carry these as I still really want that Captain America figure...and maybe a few others.  Because of their blind packaged nature it seems a lot of people are buying them in search of the variants and Ultron, yielding lots of them for sale on eBay.  In some cases for less than what they retail for.  Hmm, perhaps Cap will be mine before too much longer.